Anthony Weir

Erech/Uruk - Iraq - Poem by Anthony Weir

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We're told that writing was invented here: lists of weapons, foodstuffs, kings, kinsmen, laws and penalties.Here lived the first Man-God, Gilgamesh.Here children beg for ballpoint pens.Here there is no fence around the ruins, no turnstile, booklet, shop or guide.Here there are no tourists, toilets, postcardsor Keep Off notices.Here is the first city.Here urban evil startedto gyre its tentacles across a worldwhich now it strangles.Here was the New York and Washingtonof seven thousand years ago -

the best of man is his ruins.

Not far away is Hamurabi's Babylonwhose ruins were so recently reconquered by American Marines, and turned into a huge basewith helipad and roads wide enoughfor trucks, the shards of potteryand threshing-floorscovered with hardcore and graveldug up from elsewhere.